Nigeria’s Golden Eaglets sailed majestically into the semi-finals of the ongoing WAFU B U17 Championship in Ghana with a 3-0 whiplash of Togo’s Baby Sparrow Hawks on Thursday.
The sweet victory catapulted the Eaglets to the top of group B and set the stage for a last-four confrontation with the Baby Elephants of Cote d’Ivoire.
The semi-final should have been played on Wednesday evening, was postponed to Thursday morning after the venue became water-logged following a heavy downpour.
Forward Abdulmuiz Adeleke came up big in Thursday’s encounter with a brace, while Rapha Adams did his rising reputation no harm with his second of the tournament.
Adeleke fluffed an opportunity to put Nigeria ahead in the 6th minute but made no mistake five minutes later with an assist from Abdulmuiz Oladimeji to compound the woes of a Togolese side that had lost its previous two games in the championship.
Adams, the scorer of the lone goal that earned the five-time world champions all the points against the Niger Republic on Sunday, got close in the 20th minute off a pass from Oladimeji, but his hit missed the target.
The forward would make no mistake 15 minutes later, nodding home a sublime pull-out by captain Simon Cletus.
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Adeleke got his brace and Nigeria’s third in the 57th minute off another assist from captain Cletus.
The forward should have made it a hat-trick but fluffed a penalty kick awarded to the Eaglets in the 68th minute.
Nigeria’s Edward Ochigbo was selected as Player of the Match.
The victory meant the Golden Eaglets finished as group B winners, following Burkina Faso’s 1-0 defeat of Niger Republic in the other match of the pool.
Nigeria will now clash with Cote d’Ivoire in the second semi-final on Saturday evening (7 p.m. Nigeria time), after the first semi-final between Ghana and Burkina Faso.
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